Deer University - Culling

[Tx_Wader]

Culling = Population control.

In a high fence environment it's necessary but then I guess those people who spend millions on their 10,000 acre high fence operation don't know what they're doing.

[bloodtrailer28]

It comes down to carrying capacity of the land. Reducing the number of mouths will have reduce the pressure on the habitat. There are some confused that culling of bucks at 4 and under is making bigger bucks genetically and improving the herd. It is reducing the population of animals on the range, and the benefits of increased antler size is more likely due to more available resources for the remaining herd.

Also a lot of people don't shoot enough does and have an imbalance of bucks to does. An over abundance of does leads to a longer breeding season, which increases the likelihood of late fawns. Late fawns are behind on the nutritional plane and it takes them years to catch up. Also there is more nutritional stress put on the doe that has a late fawn, since the range conditions in the summer are usually worse than late spring. There is a lot of research in cattle on maternal affects related to the amount/quality of milk produced relative to the performance of their offspring.

Lastly, research has shown that a deer puts more nutrition into their antlers at 5+, since the majority of nutrition before that is put into body growth. If a buck is shot at 4, they don't survive to 5+

Granted there are a lot of variable in play here, but people often conflict the benefits they are seeing by shooting "culls" as genetic when in fact it is a pure nutrition and age play.

I have been on a lease for 14+ years. We had people that would shoot Every. Single. Spike.... and a "mature" trophy buck was 3.5. We never saw a 5.5 to 6.5 year old deer.
We put some basic rules, no spikes for two years, shoot more does, and we reduced the overall buck harvest. We still have little 1.5 year old spikes, and we shoot some "feeder bullies" as management deer at 5.5+. But in the last 4 years we are killing ( or seeing) 145-160" deer. I let a 4.5 year old deer that was 155 this year, and killed an old 8pt that was running some of the younger deer off (he was 6.5)

For us it is about making sure that bucks survive to 5.5 to reach some of their potential before removing their mouth.

My thoughts are worry about deer density, buck:doe ratio, and age structure of bucks (you need bucks of all age classes) first. Then IF you have that in line you can start shooting some older bucks

Just my opinions........

Well said sir and that is an educated opinion unlike most of the other opinions on here mine included

[HighwayHunter]

Culling = Population control.



In a high fence environment it's necessary but then I guess those people who spend millions on their 10,000 acre high fence operation don't know what they're doing.

High fence is a different story. That’s a controlled environment. Low fence is not


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[BowSlayer]

Culling can be different things for different leases. If you're culling for genetics you're spinning your wheels. If you have WAY too many deer and lots more bucks than does like we do you should be culling some. We cull from yearlings on up because we have too many deer. Too many mouths to feed means none of the deer ever meet their potential. I'd rather eliminate some mouths and see what the better looking young deer do with some age. Not every place is the same. I read on here several times that folks wish they would make every county in Texas an AR county. That would be a terrible idea for our county. We can't keep the numbers in check as it is without those ridiculous rules. Find something that works for you and stick with it and let everyone else do the same and we would all be happier. I hunt in East Texas and West Texas. It's a totally different ball game and you can't manage the same in both areas without doing major damage to one or the other.

[Throwin Darts]

Also a lot of people don't shoot enough does and have an imbalance of bucks to does. An over abundance of does leads to a longer breeding season, which increases the likelihood of late fawns. Late fawns are behind on the nutritional plane and it takes them years to catch up. Also there is more nutritional stress put on the doe that has a late fawn, since the range conditions in the summer are usually worse than late spring. There is a lot of research in cattle on maternal affects related to the amount/quality of milk produced relative to the performance of their offspring.

Great post Aggie PhD.

This is a great point made about doe management as well.

I'll add to this that we are shooting our does each year before the rut. We are taking their mouths off the place before the dead of winter hits and natural browse becomes more scarce. We are also avoiding shooting a bred doe that may be carrying the offspring of our better bucks. So we are shooting does as early as possible.

[HighwayHunter]

Culling = Population control.



In a high fence environment it's necessary but then I guess those people who spend millions on their 10,000 acre high fence operation don't know what they're doing.

High fence is a different story. That’s a controlled environment. Low fence is not


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[Sunnylab]

Cull= I need an excuse to kill a deer. I've seen it more times then I can count on TBH. It cracks me up! 2 or 3 year old 7 pt dead in a pic and the guy is saying " took out a cull".... uhhhh...no you didn't buddy you shot a young deer.

Now I have nothing against shooting a deer because you want to, just call it what is... killing! And leave the cull word out

My thoughts exactly!!!

[kyle1974]

Culling doesn’t work? Weird. Pretty sure after they’re dead I don’t spend a dime feeding them anymore.


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[BowSlayer]

Culling doesn’t work? Weird. Pretty sure after they’re dead I don’t spend a dime feeding them anymore.


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Works the same for me too.

[Silentnight]

You should definitely be able to tell if a buck is junk before they hit 5 or 6 years old unless you have a mess load of deer and they don't have enough food or if you have a bad growing season for native vegitation. Also if you are overpopulated the older bucks can and will keep the smaller, younger bucks from the feed. This can hurt potential for young deer if not getting proper nutrition.

If you have 2 deer at 3 years old that are similar frame, one scores 100 and the other scores 130, cull the smaller one because the larger deer has more potential. It really comes down to numbers though. If you don't have a bunch of deer in your area you might want to let smaller deer go to boost population numbers.

I hunt on family high fence land most of the time and it took years of culling (like 10 plus) but now we are up to culling 4 point and under unless they are unique for some reason. Call it crazy but we grow 150"+ typical 8 point and everything else needs to mature around the 170+ mark, unless the rack is unique for some reason. All native genetics also

[Mexico]

Beating a dead horse. Its about removing mouths from range. Especially in high fences. You expect ranches to feed all bucks to 5 yrs old before killing? Not happening. Deer must die. Every ranch has different criteria for culling, removing, decreasing population, ect. It's ludicrous to think every buck should get a pass till maturity. It's also obvious that letting the cull reach maturity will increase his score.

Guess I'm ludicrous...

[Gclyde28]

You should definitely be able to tell if a buck is junk before they hit 5 or 6 years old unless you have a mess load of deer and they don't have enough food or if you have a bad growing season for native vegitation. Also if you are overpopulated the older bucks can and will keep the smaller, younger bucks from the feed. This can hurt potential for young deer if not getting proper nutrition.

If you have 2 deer at 3 years old that are similar frame, one scores 100 and the other scores 130, cull the smaller one because the larger deer has more potential. It really comes down to numbers though. If you don't have a bunch of deer in your area you might want to let smaller deer go to boost population numbers.

I hunt on family high fence land most of the time and it took years of culling (like 10 plus) but now we are up to culling 4 point and under unless they are unique for some reason. Call it crazy but we grow 150"+ typical 8 point and everything else needs to mature around the 170+ mark, unless the rack is unique for some reason. All native genetics also

This debate was intended for low fence deer. Obviously in a high fence situation genetics can be much more easily influenced since it is a controlled scenario.

[Aggie PhD]

You should definitely be able to tell if a buck is junk before they hit 5 or 6 years old unless you have a mess load of deer and they don't have enough food or if you have a bad growing season for native vegitation. Also if you are overpopulated the older bucks can and will keep the smaller, younger bucks from the feed. This can hurt potential for young deer if not getting proper nutrition.

If you have 2 deer at 3 years old that are similar frame, one scores 100 and the other scores 130, cull the smaller one because the larger deer has more potential. It really comes down to numbers though. If you don't have a bunch of deer in your area you might want to let smaller deer go to boost population numbers.

I hunt on family high fence land most of the time and it took years of culling (like 10 plus) but now we are up to culling 4 point and under unless they are unique for some reason. Call it crazy but we grow 150"+ typical 8 point and everything else needs to mature around the 170+ mark, unless the rack is unique for some reason. All native genetics also

Unless you are hunting a 200 acre place with a small population or have introduced deer, I would argue that the majority of your goals have been achieved through reducing the population size to a sustainable level and not through genetic improvements of said herd.

One of the things to take into consideration with a high fence is that animals are unable to disperse when densities get high or range conditions are poor. Have friends with a high fence place and when they started they were killing 100-150 does and 75 bucks a year. They did this for several years and now have some absolute toads inside their fence.
Now that the population is sustainable they don't have to shoot that many, but still have to harvest a bunch every year. If I recall the calculations based upon a fawn crop, if they didn't harvest for 2 years they would be back in the same spot as they started.
In these instances, it can make sense to shoot smaller younger bucks that appear to have less potential. Why? Because you need to get rid of a mouths because of the limited resources inside the fence

[lovemylegacy]

Hmmmm, good read.

[El General]

Beating a dead horse. Its about removing mouths from range. Especially in high fences. You expect ranches to feed all bucks to 5 yrs old before killing? Not happening. Deer must die. Every ranch has different criteria for culling, removing, decreasing population, ect. It's ludicrous to think every buck should get a pass till maturity. It's also obvious that letting the cull reach maturity will increase his score.

On a free range place, if it was about reducing population, you would shoot a doe over a buck every single time. Male harvest does not effect future population. Female harvest does.